Restaurant bargains keep coming

Stacy Finz wrote about how restaurants are coping with the recession in yesterday’s Chronicle. It’s a tough time for restaurants, but it’s a great time to be a diner. Many restaurants are lowering prices and offering special deals, much like many retail stores.

One of the best deals I’ve seen is being offered at Luna Park, the American focused restaurant in the Mission owned by A.J. Gilbert, who also opened a branch a few years ago in Los Angeles. From Dec. 16-23, the restaurant is offering a three-course family-style dinner for six or more for $15 a person. That’s right — only $15.

It starts with a choice of spinach salad with pomegranates, walnuts and feta, a seasonal soup or the signature warm goat cheese fondue with grilled bread and sliced apples.

The main course is herb stuffed turkey roulade with sage and black pepper gravy or honey-glazed smoked ham. Both are accompanied by buttermilk mashed potatoes, herbed corn bread stuffing and green beans with lemon, shallots and olive oil.

Dessert is a choice of coconut cream pie (it’s one of the best around), pecan pie or their classic Make Your Own S’mores.

I’ve gotten about a dozen special deals being offered by restaurants recently, but this is the best. It should make for a very busy week for the gang at Luna Park.